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User blog:Brady26/Castle Naerytar
Whilst Barion, Kadmos and Rack travelled deep into the Swamp of Dead Men reaching Castle Naerytar, Darion remained behind in Carnath Roadhouse. Darion Relthorne, Officer of the Hallowed Assault, the Champion of Greenest, Defender of the Drowned Road, was alone. As Murry winked out, Darion knew his allies were below the roadhouse in a tunnel headed east, he thought back to the words of Ontharr Frume to answer the question of where the cult is taking the gold and what they plan to do with it, the words of the golden druid in the clearing that told him to follow the river of gold along with a warning that not all will survive. Glancing around the rain soaked grounds, he saw familiar faces; Ardred the commander of the guards who instructed him to search for intruders but doubted that strangers had infiitrated the roadhouse to steal the gold of a few workers. He saw faces from the Drowned Road, members of the cult that looked at him with revulsion, others with fear and trepidation. Thoughts on how to proceed filled his head, as Murry had told him the tunnel was narrow, too narrow for him in his plate and enhanced stature, he would need to travel over land to reach them. Speaking with Ardred, Darion requested that he take the boy Wump to Easthearth, offering a hefty sum of gold for him to take him to The Toad's Stool ''inn, claiming that he knew the boy's father. Ardred found the large amount of gold suspicious as it was far more gold than Darion should have earned, and there recently was a break in to the storehouse where all the gold was kept, though he though better of accusing the giant man of any wrongdoing and instead decided to fulfill his request to take the boy away. Darion then went to Wump in the stables and told him he was going to be taken away from the roadhouse and brought to an inn in Easthearth where he would wait for friends to take him to Greenest far in the south. Darion then went to the room where Meric Vunn was staying, demanding he speak with him at the door, after refusing to yield, Meric stepped out into the hallway, Darion handing him a fistful of gold, turning away to leave the aspiring dragon scholar alone. Believing he had fulfilled the various oaths and promises he had made to the people of the roadhouse he had come to know, Darion deserted his post as a guard and set off down the road. Once he had travelled for some time he began to pray, calling forth the form of Sal, his companion mount he had not seen in many months. With his trusty steed, Darion set off east, to the Swamp of Dead Men. After a few hours Darion spotted some dancing lights in the distance that seemed to be creating a trail for him to follow, after some discussion with Sal, they followed the lights to a pond in the swamp which seemed to be a dead end until a voice began to speak out to Darion. The voice asked what a paladin was doing inside their kingdom, what had brought a follower of foreign gods to a land that knew none but the speaker, knowing that to show weakness would risk his life, Darion stood firm and asked that the speaker might reveal themselves. From the pond, a colossal black dragon rose from the dark waters, the monster began to walk around Darion as he remained mounted on Sal, the dragon clearly curious as to why an interloper would be in the realm it claimed as its own. Speaking guardedly with the dragon, Darion struck a deal with the creature; the Scaly Death tribe of lizardfolk that worship the dragon would aid him in entering Castle Naerytar to where his allies were taken, in exchange Darion would destroy the ''farseer device atop the central keep. Accepting the offer, the dragon showed Darion the route to travel through the swamp, the dragon disapearring into the fog. Atop Sal, Darion travelled for hours through the Swamp of Dead Men, coming upon a trail of totem markers that he followed to a lake, where he waited for the Scaly Death tribe to arrive. Eventually, a group of lizardfolk arrived, one naming himself as Snapjaw in pidgin Common arranging for Darion to be smuggled into the castle, hiding him beneath a cloth in a canoe then into a wagon that was dragged through the muck, carried through the barbican and through the castle to the room of the rest of the group in the south eastern tower. Dropping him onto the floor in front of the group, the lizardfolk skulked off, with Snapjaw once again introducing himself. The group updated each other about what had happened since they split up back at Carnath Roadhouse. After discussing how they should proceed, a lizardfolk came informing them that Dralmorrer wished to see them, and he led the group, except for Darion who remained in the room, to the small chapel that had been converted to honour Tiamat. There Dralmorrer greeted them and attempted to establish which part of the Cult of Tiamat they were part of, seeming to be concerned they were of some other faction within the cult, but the group managed to satisfy him that they were looking to advance themselves alongside him. Kadmos once again had to speak for the group as Dralmorrer was eager to speak in elvish to him about the Quel'Doran Empire, taking them upstairs to a library where he shared with him his love of the strange workings of the universe. After the meeting the group was approached by Azbara Jos, the Zelfolk diplomat who invited them to his room in the keep to reminise of their journey along the Fields of the Drowned. Meanwhile, Snapjaw came to Darion in the room, asking if he was the Champion of "Scaly Death" there to save them from the "frogmen". Darion saw this as an oppurtunity to get some allies within the castle so went along with the idea, getting as much information from the lizardfolk as he could about how many cultists and bullywugs there were. Convincing Snapjaw that he and his group were there to rescue them, he arranged to meet Snapjaw and other lizardfolk warriors in the forge at nightfall. When the group returned they listened to Darion's plan and decided it would make a good oppurtunity to explore the castle whilst the defenders were busy with the bullywugs and the lizardfolk at each other's throats, also Snapjaw revealed that the cultists take their gold down beneath the castle to the stinking tunnels below. They decided they would see what Azbara Jos wanted first, try and understand what his role in all this was, the Zelfolk wizard welcoming them into his small room with warm cups of salim, a bitter tea that he shared amongst them. After a few pleasntries Jos cut right to the point, that he did not know who they were within the cult but could tell they were trying to advance themselves faster than the other cultists he had met in the Fields of the Drowned and did not wish to be their enemy, so he requested that if they were going to make a move that they consider him a neutral party, he was willing to work with the cult itself, he did not care who was in charge. After the group agreed to keep this in mind, they left Azbara and returned to Darion to await the lizardfolk. Grabbing some food for the likely quite hungry paladin from the kitchens first. The group waited for their moment, joining up with Snapjaw and the other lizardfolk who had their crude iron weapons ready. With a ferocious warcry the lizardfolk began to hack apart the bullywugs in the Outer Ward, the blood spilling out on the muck. Making their way through the Wards as the castle erupted into mayhem, the group, led by Snapjaw, passed through the great hall towards the entrance to the caves below the castle. In the Great Hall the group was called out by Bornian who demanded to know what was happening, shouting him down, Darion told him to keep to his duty and that the lizardfolk and the bullywugs were fighting one another and they were going down to make sure that none of the bullywugs below came up to join the fray. Passing into the tunnel leading below, Snapjaw seemed to lose his nerve and scurried off, fearing Pharblex and his followers, leaving the group to descend the dark passage alone. The group found treasure, bullywugs and monstrous creatures below the castle, which they slew and fought making their way to a large cavern where Pharblex Spattergoo was preaching to an assembly of bullywugs. The group surged forward into the cavern, cutting down many bullywugs as Rack used his new magic boots to travel at super speed so that he was standing right next to the bullywug shaman, who panicked and used his magic to push Rack away and dove into the waters below as his minions died around him. Hoping to pursue the frogman leader of the bullywugs, the group cast their eyes around the dark cavern, those with enhanced vision seeing the soggy preacher clambering out of the water nearby. Pointing him out, Rack sprinted after him into the dark, catching him in a foggy room, the darkness and mists preventing him from landing a blow as once again Pharblex scurried down a room. Waiting for the rest of the group, they made their way together down after Pharblex, finding him in some sort of altar room with his most loyal followers. After exchanging taunts, the group moved in, getting bogged down in a mire of bullywugs that desperatly tried to hold back the group. Eventually, after Pharblex displayed his mastery of magic, Darion burst the heads of the last few warriors with the shatter spell, ending the hopes of the bullywug shaman. Stepping down off his podium, Pharblex Spattergoo begged for his life, the group arguing over whether they should kill him or not, with Kadmos taking action and ending his life, nobody caring once the deed was done. Exploring the back of the altar room the group fell victim to a hallucinogenic gas trap on a chest that caused all except Darion to attack those nearest to them, with the group nearly destroying itself as Darion tried to undo the effects of the gas. Recovering a bit the group took stock of where they had explored already, Barion finding two spellbooks that Pharblex appeared to have been keeping for himself, inside he found many powerful new spells he could learn. Entering the room with the mist, the group followed it into another room where it seemed to be flowing from, there they found a teleportation circle which Barion examined, realising it needed a passphrase to activate, the group wondering if Pharblex knew it. Deciding to explore the few places they had not yet discovered in the cave and castle, the group made their way to the surface where they found Snapjaw surrounded by many bodies of bullywugs which they were burning. Knocking on the kitchen door the group heard that the cook and his assistants were still inside, Barion suspecting they might know something, Darion demanded they open up under orders from Dralmorrer. Inside they found just the cooks and their supplies, but they did learn that Rezmir's office was above the library and set off there to see if she was there, hoping to kill her. Entering the chapel, the group made their way up the stairs past the library and up to Rezmir's office. There they found the password for the teleportation circle, Draezir, and a number of valuable items that they took. Entering her private rooms, Barion opened her wardrobe after inspecting it for magical traps, only for vials of acid on the inside of the door, undetected by his magic to burst open, coating him in burning liquid that ruined the clothes inside the room and nearly killing Barion, who Darion had to heal before his wounds proved fatal. In a sanctum praying room, the group found a mural depicting a mountain bursting with a five headed dragon they identified as Tiamat coming forth from a volcano as other dragons bowed to her divinity. Taking the password back to the teleportation circle without incident, the group stood in a circle as they prepared to pass through the portal together unsure of where they would be when they did. At the moment Barion was about to say the word, he stopped, hesitating as he wanted to get some things straight before they did it, but in that moment the mists formed two shapes as Dralmorrer and Azbara Jos emerged from the portal mid conversation, the two groups surprised to see each other. Category:Blog posts